Insatiable Avarice
Lent 2021: Seven Deadly Sins • Sermon • Submitted
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How Much Land?
How Much Land?
Most know Leo Tolstoy for his whopping 1,225 page War & Peace, but he also occasionally wrote short stories. One such story is, “How much land does a man need?”
Pahom was a Russian peasant. “If I had plenty of land, I shouldn't fear the Devil himself!”
Unfortunately for Pahom, the Devil was hiding behind his stove, and decided to take him up on that bet.
Pahom meets the Bashkirs, who offer a deal: For 1,000 rubles (About $15) Pahom can have as much land as he can walk around.
Conditon: Pahom only has one day, and must be back to his starting point by sunset.
Pahom hurries to walk as far as he can.
When he sees the sun setting he is afraid he won’t make it back in time.
Pahom sprints to make it to the top of the hill where he started.
He makes it, only to fall dead from exhaustion.
His servant buries him, and thus answers the question: “How much land does a man need?” About 6ft by 3ft.
Avarice and Carelessness: Two Extremes
Avarice and Carelessness: Two Extremes
“Avarice” is just another word for “greed”.
Avarice is the excessive love of money and all that it can buy.
The bible speaks about the importance of good stewardship much more than other sins
At its heart, Avarice is a failure to appropriately appreciate the true value of the things we have. At the opposite extreme, however is pure carelessness.
Avarice overvalues things, whereas Carelessness undervalues them.
Parable of the Rich Fool (Luke 12) Avarice
The New Revised Standard Version The Parable of the Rich Fool
Then he told them a parable: “The land of a rich man produced abundantly. 17 And he thought to himself, ‘What should I do, for I have no place to store my crops?’ 18 Then he said, ‘I will do this: I will pull down my barns and build larger ones, and there I will store all my grain and my goods. 19 And I will say to my soul, Soul, you have ample goods laid up for many years; relax, eat, drink, be merry.’ 20 But God said to him, ‘You fool! This very night your life is being demanded of you. And the things you have prepared, whose will they be?’ 21 So it is with those who store up treasures for themselves but are not rich toward God.”
Parable of the Prodigal Son (Luke 15) Carelessness
Much easier to be generous with other people’s things!
Ironically, it is possible for a person to have both of these vices. This creates a vicious circle as we squander what we have and then do everything we can to get more
Scripture encourages us to live between Avarice and Carelessness as Generous.
Naboth’s Vineyard: Greed’s Deadly End
Naboth’s Vineyard: Greed’s Deadly End
But is Greed really so bad?
Our culture seems to think Greed is, at the very least, a necessary evil
Greed is the American Dream
Greed, some argue, is a necessary component of American Capitalism.
Consider Ahab
Ahab Becomes convinced that this Garden is his
Greed is not only about having more, but about having what’s mine
Ahab’s Greed ultimately leads to him murdering Naboth for what he considered “rightfully his”
Greed moves us to use people to serve our love of money rather than using our money to serve people
Greed leads us to value things over people
At its worst, Greed leads us to refuse even the basic demands of justice
We become so obsessed with obtaining things that we’re even willing to deprive others in order to have them
Ahab was comfortable doing this, especially since the one he deprived was safely out of sight.
Thus, greed leads to an insensibility to mercy, i.e. hardheartedness.
St. Basil reminds us, “It is the hungry one’s bread you hoard, the naked one’s cloak you retain, the needy one’s money you withhold. Wherefore as many as you have wronged, you might have aided.”
So Greed is dangerous, and its effects are deadly. But what causes such a hard heart?
Jesus teaches us that, very often, our Greed comes from a deep fear of need.
Those who lived through the great depression came out as very frugal people, scarred by their experience of great need.
It is easier to have the means to provide for ourselves than to rely on God to provide
The problem is that once we make this move, our greed blinds us from ever seeing what is enough.
Our fear of need leads us to hoard riches
The more we possess, the more money, time, and energy we spend to protect it all.
In this way, wealth actually increases our anxiety all the more!
The more we have, the more we feel we need, because as we get these possessions we realize that they’re not enough to meet our desire for security, a security that only God can offer us.
Like Pahom, we can’t see when enough is enough. Greed continues to grow in us until we see all things as “mine”.
The great irony is that none of these things are rightfully ours. God owns the earth and all that is in it.
The solution, Christ tells us, is to trust in God’s love for us.
God owns all creation, and Jesus points out that he also provides for all creation.
He calls us away from Greed, which sees all as “mine”, and toward gratefulness and humility
In short, this is a call to recognize that not only our things, but our very selves belong to God. And God cares for his creatures.
To claim that all that is ours as a gift from God is to see the creation as something to be celebrated rather than consumed.
Cultivating Generosity
Cultivating Generosity
But what does this look like practically?
Professor/Student vow of poverty
What they defined as voluntary poverty was still living above what most people have for most of human history
The point is not to live on crusts of bread with bare walls and threadbare clothes, but to live in a way free from being enslaved to our stuff.
Do you own your possessions, or do they own you?
Do you give all you can You who receive five hundred pounds a year, and spend only two hundred, do you give three hundred back to God If not, you certainly rob God of that three hundred. You that receive two hundred, and spend but one, do you give God the other hundred If not, you rob him of just so much. "Nay, may I not do what I will with my own" Here lies the ground of your mistake. It is not your own. It cannot be, unless you are Lord of heaven and earth. "However, I must provide for my children." Certainly. But how By making them rich Then you will probably make them Heathens, as some of you have done already. "What shall I do, then" Lord, speak to their hearts! else the Preacher speaks in vain. Leave them enough to live on, not in idleness and luxury, but by honest industry. And if you have not children, upon what scriptural or rational principle can you leave a groat behind you more than will bury you I pray consider, what are you the better for what you leave behind you What does it signify, whether you leave behind you ten thousand pounds, or ten thousand shoes and boots O leave nothing behind you! Send all you have before you into a better world! Lend it, lend it all unto the Lord, and it shall be paid you again!
-John Wesley